Sure, if you don't care about the false positive rate of your prediction function.

What are the downsides to missing a legit listing on Craigslist versus falling for one of these scams? I think in this case, having a prediction function with high low false negative rate, but high false positive rate for scams is better than the inverse.

What are the downsides to missing a “looks to good to be true” listing that’s real? You miss the great listing... obviously. And great listings are not at all easy to come by in that area.

To be fair my last apartment I rented off Craigslist:

- He paid me $1000 to move in

- Gave me all of his furniture for free

- Paid my application fee

I actually got the apartment via a sublease and opted to continue his lease. A few months ago I sold the furniture for a profit and moved with no issue.

I can respect that. Perhaps I'm being unfair.

In my area and my experience, I've had about a half dozen interactions with Facebook for significant things. 4/6 were straight up scams.